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Video: One million climate jobs now!

Posted on April 28, 2012

The Trade Union Group of the UK Campaign against Climate Change is organizing a Climate Jobs Caravan in England and Scotland in May.

Based on the Million Climate Jobs report, produced with the assistance of the CWU, PCS, TSSA & UCU trade unions, the Caravan will highlight how creating climate jobs can help us tackle the twin crises of the ecomony and climate change.

This inspiring video sets out the caravan’s message. The full 33-minute version, along with 8 other videos about the struggle for justice, can be purchased on a DVD from Reel News

“One million climate jobs is a massively ambitious goal, we agree and at first sight it will look unrealistic to many. But we are facing an emergency and we need to start making the seemingly impossible – possible.

“What we are really talking about is a massive effort to transform the economy, along the lines, and on the scale, of what has previously been acheived in war time – in the US, for instance, in 1941 when car factories were transformed into tank factories inside a few months – and when the whole economy was turned around to concentrate solely on producing materials for the war effort in a very short time.

“We need something similar but this time it will be an economy focussed on preventing catstrophic climate change rather than on waging war – and we will concentrate on achieving a low or zero carbon economy as soon as possible.

“This will need a lot of work done in a very short time and this will neccessarily mean jobs – lots of jobs.

“Many in government will tell you we need to be making cuts – but the lesson of previous recessions is that it was not cuts but well targeted spending than lifted us out of recession. We need a massive investment in a green economy – and the planet we live on – now!”